According to this chapter, moving family policy forward into the future will requires a critical historic analysis of the past in order to establish a clear foundation of family policy. The author proposes two approaches; adopting a specific broad-based family policy that support family and supporting efforts towards promoting family policies across a wide range of issues. In order to strengthen families, the author argues that these two methods should not be seen as contradicting each other but the best methods that can be used to achieve the common aim of strengthening family.
In analyzing the specific family policy, the author identifies a number of characteristics that make social program to be successful in the United State of America. He points out that, success of social program is determined by the ability of the policy to articulate the important values the family provides to the society, be able to encourage voluntarism, to incorporate all people and the ability of the program to secure resources that are available. He also suggests that in order to promote family perspective in policy making one needs to know the history of family impact statement and the toolsss that required to promote family perspective in policy making. He further proposes ways in which professionals are supposed to conduct family impact analysis. Other than that, the author provides a detailed analysis of each method and finally comes to a conclusion that, irrespective of the approaches, both methods are directed towards a common goal of strengthening family policy. ?